Interior Car Heater/defroster on 2040-parts.com

Electric Rolls Royce Phantom dropped

Electric Rolls Royce - not being built   Everyone’s at it – building electric cars, that is – and Rolls Royce are no different. They even put together an electric Rolls Royce Phantom for the Geneva Motor Show earlier this year. And in many ways you can almost see the logic in an electric Rolls Royce.

Volkswagen hits back, weighs making a bid for Porsche

Volkswagen is considering an audacious reverse-takeover bid for its majority shareholder, Porsche, in a twist in the drawn-out struggle for control between the two German carmakers. The Volkswagen Group's supervisory board is said to be weighing the possibility of purchasing Porsche AG, in a move that would relieve its holding company, Porsche SE, of massive debt that industry analysts suggest the company may not be able to fund should the world's financial crisis drag on well into 2010--a scenario put forward this week by the International Monetary Fund. The secret plan emerged as shareholders were set to convene at Volkswagen's annual meeting on Thursday, and it comes after Porsche revealed that it is carrying some 9 billion euros ($11.73 billion) in debt, most of it owing to interest on loans taken out to purchase its 50.8 percent stake in VW.

Mercedes-Benz B-Class

The rather unloved yet brilliantly packaged Mercedes B-Class will enter its second generation at next month's Frankfurt motor show. Gone, sadly, is the ingenious sandwich floor construction, replaced by a conventional front-drive platform. The result is a reduction in height by 48mm to 1557mm, while length has grown by 89mm and width by 11mm.